The present design relates to a cufflink, more particularly to a cufflink reduced in number of parts, simplified in construction and facilitated in manufacture.
In general, a conventional cufflink is constituted by a decorative head element and a shank and keeper unit. The shank and keeper unit is provided with a keeper which is movable between the axial direction of the unit and the direction normal thereto. For installation of the cufflink the unit is passed through aligned holes on opposite ends of the shirt cuff with this keeper laid flat axially. Then the keeper is turned ninety degrees from position to the direction normal to the axial direction of the unit to install the cufflink to a shirt cuff. This has for many years been a general construction of cufflinks. The cufflink of abovementioned conventional construction makes troublesome the insertion through cuff button holes of the shank and keeper unit fabricated integrally with the decorative head element. Also, the shank and keeper unit is easily rotated by accidental contact with objects such as clothing, etc. thereby spoiling the wearing appearance of the cufflink and further posing a danger that the cufflink might fall off from the cuff and get lost.
In addition, the conventional cufflink of this type is suitable to be used for those shirts of doubled-back cuffs which are so-called double-cuffed shirts so that it was used originally for these shirts having no buttons installed at the cuffs.
However, in the case of convertible single-cuffed shirts, buttons are already installed in place. As a result, the cufflink of conventional construction showed a disadvantage in that it cannot hide this button thereby degrading the wearing appearance of such a shirt with such cufflinks.
For this reason, the present inventor previously has proposed a cufflink capable of hiding the button of a convertible single-cuffed shirt and of being assembled and disassembled simply by touch, by forming the decorative head element and the shank and keeper unit separately and constructing them so that they can be assembled and disassembled to and from each other freely. See U.S. Pat. No. 4,242,776, issued Jan. 6, 1981 and copending U.S. patent application of Kurashima, Ser. No. 282,929, filed July 13, 1981, now U.S. Pat. No. 4,361,936 issued Dec. 7, 1982.
The prior cufflink of the present inventor is excellent in that it is simply in construction, easy in assembly and disassembly and good in appearance. However, a projection to be fitted by the tip end of the shank portion of its shank and keeper unit is provided on the fixture which is separated from the decorative head element. This increased the parts number by that of the fixture and made it necessary to secure by screws this fixture that is small in size. Further, this screw-installing operation proved to be extremely complicated and troublesome.